Rugby Lions Tour: Clive Woodward will today become the first Englishman to be given the job of Lions coach and he will be encouraged to nominate his own management team.
With the former England captain Bill Beaumont, a playing colleague of Woodward's on the 1980 Lions tour to South Africa, filling the manager's role for next year's tour to New Zealand, some fear that the tourists will amount to England in red jerseys.
"Just because England have proved they are the best team in the world and capable of winning consistently in the Southern Hemisphere, it does not mean that the other unions are not capable of making important contributions to the tour," said the former England captain Roger Uttley, the assistant coach on the tour to Australia in 1989.
The Lions chief executive John Feehan said no restrictions would be imposed on the coach when it came to the back-up management team after suggestions that the coaches of all the four home unions would go on tour.
Woodward and the Ireland coach Eddie O'Sullivan were interviewed by the Lions committee this week after being nominated by their unions as the successor to Graham Henry, who will be plotting the touring team's downfall next year, as coach.
The winner will be announced today with Woodward, whose record over the past four years with England matches that of any national coach in history, the clear favourite. O'Sullivan, who has presided over Ireland's resurgence, is expected to go to New Zealand as the assistant coach.
The last Englishman to coach the Lions was Brian Vaughan on the 1962 tour to South Africa. He was the manager and assumed the role of coach because there was no one else to do the job.
"We hope to have the back-up team sorted out by April," said Feehan, who confirmed the Lions would play 10 matches. "There is no question of the coach having anyone imposed on him: his views are of paramount importance."
The England management trio of Andy Robinson, Phil Larder and Dave Alred went to Australia with Henry and could expect to be nominated by Woodward.
A protest from the Celts about the Lions's ethos not being observed would be unlikely.
"We take the view that England are the best team in the world and they are bound to be strongly represented," said an IRFU spokesman. "We hope that Eddie gets the coaching job, but were he to miss out we would be honoured if he were made part of the management team. This is the professional era and it is not a question of how many are going from each country, but how good they are."
